In a packet communication network, two nodes communicate with each other by sending packets. A packet is a data unit that comprises a header for information about the packet and a payload (body part) for data transmitted via the packet. Generally, the header comprises information such as the type of the packet, the source address, and the destination address.
Unfortunately, a significant portion of a transmitted packet is the header. For example, it is known that about 38.9% of the packets transmitted via the Internet have a total length of 40 bytes. These packets are in accordance with the Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) and since IPv4 requires a header of 20 bytes, only 50% of the occupied bandwidth of an IP packet is used for the payload.